Why Do Birds Chirp At 3 AM? Simple Explanation

If you’re a normal human being, you can’t argue the fact that it is very frustrating to have birds constantly chirping at your window in the middle of the night.

Movies never portray birds as night creatures so this might be confusing for normal people that don’t know a whole lot about birds. So why would birds, either pets or wild ones, start chirping at 3 am?

Well, it’s not actually that birds chirp at 3 AM in the morning because they have a specific reason. It’s more about the fact that their voice will travel better when it’s quiet outside. Birds will usually chirp all the time when they are awake, but during the night everyone is sleeping, and sounds are heard louder. You might think that birds wake up just to chirp at your window to annoy you, but the truth is, they are probably trying to annoy you all throughout the day, you’re just focused on other things to notice.

If you have a pet bird in a cage and notice it is very silent throughout the day and only starts chirping early in the morning, then you might want to check out what’s triggering it to want to chirp.

You might also like my articles on whether birds can get down syndrome, whether birds can get high, and where cardinals sleep.

In the next part of the article, I’ll go over some of the obvious reasons why birds might start chirping at 3 AM.

Reasons Why Birds Would Chirp Early In The Morning

1. Too Much Noise Near Their Resting Spot

This is usually a problem for a pet bird. Wild birds will just find another place to rest if they notice loud sounds close to their resting place. But a pet bird can’t really escape.

This means that if your bird will try to sleep in its cage but someone will start to make a lot of notice in a nearby room, the bird will get bothered to the point that it will start to make noise.

When a bird is woken up by loud sounds it might get agitated or scared. This will lead to some loud chirping. This is a common issue for pet bird owners that don’t know how to place the cage for the bird’s wellbeing. It is very important for the cage to be placed in a quiet area that wouldn’t give a bird any reasons to get agitated, especially considering that birds do get scared easily.
Birds will react pretty badly to loud noise when they are resting and chirping isn’t the only reaction you will get from them. Some of them might even start shaking or make aggressive movements, depending on the type of bird and the type of sound.

Don’t just account for the sounds from inside the house. You should also make sure you place the cage away from any windows with intense road traffic or construction noise.

Most of the time, you will notice that as soon as you move the cage away from the loud noise, the bird will stop waking up early and chirping.

You can even invest in a veil to protect the birdcage, although veils that are completely soundproof are basically impossible to find.

2. Sleeping Too Early

This is usually a problem you will have with younger birds.

When they are young, birds have a harder time sticking to a proper schedule, meaning that they will usually go to sleep too early, which would cause them to also wake up earlier than they should, some of them even around 3 AM.

During the months when the sun will come up earlier, the birds will also be woken up by the light, causing them to start chirping a lot earlier than usual.
Birds will set their own schedule and will have their own sleep pattern but if you notice this pattern being really out of the ordinary, you can try training your pet bird to sleep when it should.

Training a bird to do anything will take a lot of work, but it will be worth it when, at some point, you will be able to sleep properly, without a screaming bird at your ear.

Why Would A Lot Of Birds Start Chirping At Night?

If it doesn’t happen often but one night you notice that a lot of birds will start chirping all at the same time, this is usually an indication that they have been woken up and scared by something they consider a threat. It can be anything from lurking predators to loud noises or anything else they might find out of the ordinary. This would wake up a survival instinct in them that will make them make noises to alert other members of their social group. They will also start flapping their wings, move aggressively and even fly away.

Conclusion

So to wrap things up: Why would birds chirp at 3 AM?

Most of the time birds sleep at 3 AM, so to figure out why they are chirping you will first need to understand why they are up at that hour. It might be that the sun is starting to come up, which ould cause them to wake up, or, if it’s still dark outside, then they might have been woken up by something they consider a threat. This can be anything from predators to loud noises, or other threats.